Back to the Beginning
by hellburner21
Summary: Inspired by the Youtube videos "What if Star Wars Episode I, II, and III Were Good?" This is a new take on the Prequel trilogy. Small Disclaimer: I have not read or included any information from the extended universe in this story.
1. Chapter 1

A long time ago in a galaxy far far away. ..

STAR WARS:

The Phantom Menace

Strong and stable, the Galactic Republic is the greatest force in the galaxy, but a dark threat looms on the horizon. A number of unexplained deaths have occurred throughout the many systems which command the galactic force. These unsolved mysteries linger in the minds of the Republic people as a new celebration turns their gaze to a far off world.

The young heir to the throne of Naboo has come of age. A grand celebration has opened the planet up to representatives and guests from around the galaxy in ways it has not been since the council murders began. Secretly, this celebration is a ploy to lure the murderer to Naboo. Jedi knights have been dispatched to protect the royal family and catch the conspirators.

Naboo Palace Night:

The room was dark and cold. Padme woke to the twist in her stomach first and the sound of someone bursting through the door next. Her hand slid over the side of the bed as she feigned a heavy sleep. Slowly, her fingers tucked under the side of the wooden frame until they caught on the small hatch. The princess flipped it and the secret drawer opened against her hand. She pulled the small blaster from the dark space inside. Slipping it under the sheets, she waited for the footsteps in her sitting room to come closer.

They did, and then –strangely enough, decided to linger in the doorway. The princess waited a few moments, holding her breath, wondering why anyone would steel past her guards and break into her room just to get cold feet in the _second_ doorway. _Maybe I should just jump up and shoot first._

Then the feet began to move again. The hair on Padme's neck began to prickle when she felt him nearing her bed. He was moving in front of the window. She had to fight a shiver, seeing the intruder's shadow graced the opposite wall. His arm stretched out and he slowly reached for her, but his hand froze hovering in the air over her shoulder. She took her chance and tore off her blanket, pulling out the blaster before she'd even finished rolling around to face him.

A young man with reddish hair and eyes –that were clearly blue, even in the low light, stared back at her like she'd lit herself on fire. His hand was still hovering in the air where her shoulder had been, leaving his fingers right in front of the blaster's barrel. His hand twitched and Padme pulled the trigger without thinking twice.

The gun when off, but it also went out, out of her hand and into the wall behind her. She was left, lying in bed, in her nightgown, empty handed, with a stranger looming over top of her. Yet _somehow_ , from the look on the young man's face, she got the feeling _she_ was the more comfortable one in the situation.

He began pulling back his hand. She didn't wait to sit up and pull back her fist. He wasn't as quick to knock her hand away as he had been with her blaster. She socked him in the nose and tumbled out of bed before he could reach out to grab her again.

"Wait!" he shouted, but it came out muffled by the hand holding his bleeding nose. "Hang on a minute." She didn't. The princess raced around the room and forced open one of the doors. A group of men in black robes were filling the halls. Blasters – _big_ blasters, swung from their hips. They seemed to be headed straight for the royal suites.

 _What is going on?!_ She closed the door swiftly and ducked back through the dark room then glanced over at the redhead holding his nose. _Wimp,_ she thought.

"Are you with them?" she said, gesturing at the door. He shook his head. "Good, open that window behind you."

He started to ask questions, but she pushed past him. She should have still been leery, but there would be time for that once she'd gotten out of her dead-end room. _Besides, he's much more concerned about his nose than me,_ she noted, watching how he struggled to open the window one handed. The princess shook her head and bent down to scoop up her discarded blaster. When she glanced back up, he was opening the window with _no_ hands at all!

"You're a Jedi?" she asked, moving back to her bed and throwing a few pillows under the blankets to look like a body. He turned to nod at her as she crossed the room. He stepped away as she got closer, but she just stepped too and shoved him toward the window. He lifted his leg over the sill and tumbled out. She put her hands on the sill and started to lift herself over, when his hand reappeared to help.

Padme glanced back at the room one last time and took his fingers in hers.

"In that case," she whispered, hopping up onto the sill then dropped down into the garden beside him. "I'm sorry about your nose."

"I'm sorry this is happening to you," he replied in a very stoic Jedi fashion, but it was difficult to take seriously while he still had his other hand clasped around his nose.

The princess started to try and move again, but his hand tightened around hers and pulled her back into the palace wall. He shook his head and motioned up at the window. She didn't dare try to look, but the hair on the back of her neck told her that there was someone looking out of it.

"Did you close it?" she mouthed. The Jedi nodded. "Can he see us?" He shook his head. Padme slumped back against the wall and looked at him. She wasn't sure she believed him.

The moonlight illuminated them against the palace backdrop. His whole face was bathed in the night light. His hair was redder than she'd thought and there was a hint of a beard growing on his cheeks and neck. The look in his eye was soft, but the frown on his lips said he was still uncomfortable. His hand dropped from his nose when he realized she was studying him.

The tip of his nose to the bottom of his lip was covered in blood. She moved her hand and realized he was still holding onto it. Shifting slowly, she picked up her other hand and pulled down on the loose sleeve of her nightgown. She lifted the material to his mouth and tried to wipe away the blood. Red stains spread on the pale blue fabric as he stared at her. His lips pressed even tighter together.

"I think they are gone, we should try to move someplace safer," he whispered. She paused, hearing his thick Alderaan accent for the first time.

"Your majesty," he added with a small bow of his head that made his nose collide with her knuckles.

"Call me Padme," she told him, pulling her hand down. "You earned it." His carefully pursed lips twitched up.

"I'm Obi-Wan Kenobi, but anyone who can get in this good of a hit, gets to call me Ben."


	2. Chapter 2

Naboo Palace Garden Night:

Bathed in moonlight in a billowing pale nightgown, cheeks flushed and hair flowing, Padme Amidala looked like the queen she was. Ben _probably_ should have mentioned that to her. He was going to, and then she put her fingers on his lips. He didn't really know what to do with that. There was no Jedi training session on how to politely pull away from royalty that's trying to wipe the blood off your face _that she put there!_

There was equally limited training on what to do if pulling away was the last thing on your mind, but he still should have. He shouldn't have let her get close at all, _and_ he should have told her that her father was dead, _and_ he should have mentioned that now she was responsible for the lives of a planet full of people, _and_ he absolutely should have let go of her hand sooner. Instead, he'd just sat and stared at her. _I am a terrible Jedi…_

As they walked, Ben could feel the wind shift. He froze. Something was off in the air. He could feel it turning up the hair on the back of his neck. Then suddenly, something turned in the pit of his stomach and he jumped.

The young padawan grabbed the new queen by her shoulders, shoved her to the ground, threw himself on top of her, and rolled them into the shadows. She glared suddenly up at him, and he let their eyes meet for what he counted as the sixth time. She looked a little less like royalty with leaves in her hair and a childlike frown on her face. Her lips began to pull apart and he set his hand on her mouth.

She glared at him. _Now we're even_ , he thought. She squirmed a little, but he let his eyes finally pull away from hers to look at the dark figures racing across the same path they'd just been on. When he glanced back down she was staring at him with some vague expression. Her head titled a little, like a sort of acknowledging nod. He removed his hand from her mouth and pulled away.

She sat up slightly as he glanced out at the moonlit path again. Nothing was there, but he was certain that didn't make it safe. _I need to get back to Qui-Gon_. It had been hours since they'd landed with the other Republic representatives. Everything had seemed so different on the ship, so simple.

They were supposed to go to the celebrations, investigate and try to find anyone suspicious, all the while, keeping an eye on the royal family. Ben hadn't even expected to really do anything. He had been on missions before, but he hadn't been in the field very long. If he was being honest with himself, he also thought the plan had been too obvious to work. The killer hadn't needed an invitation to slaughter the leaders in other systems. Why would he jump at the chance now? But the moment the ship touched down, he could feel how mistaken he was. He hadn't needed to see the frown on his master's face to know something had gone terribly wrong.

He could sense something, something Qui-Gon couldn't name, which made it even more unsettling. Even now, in the bushes with Padme, he could feel it clinging to him like a parasite. The feeling chilled his bones and boiled his blood. He couldn't ignore it, couldn't shake it. Something on this planet was worse than a murderer.

"Is it safe?" Padme whispered so suddenly it made Ben jump, at least as much as a nearly trained Jedi can. He glanced back at her. She never seemed to stop being a surprise, which was a novelty in his predictable, orderly, force-filled life. _Stop it! Think of how surprised she'll be by_ you _when you tell her you watched her father bleed out on his bedroom floor._

Only an hour ago, Qui-Gon had raced them from the landing docks to the palace without explanation. They broke into the palace through a servant's door and it wasn't until after they'd run through half a wing of the marble building that they finally found a conscious guard to point out the location of the royal family. He wasn't coherent enough to say what had happened to the others.

When they reach the royal bedchamber the door had already been opened widely, as if to display the king of Naboo, sprawled on the floor with his spleen open. Qui-Gon had tried to help, but nothing could be done. He shut the man's suffering eyes and turned to Ben.

"Go find the queen," he'd said. After that, Ben was improvising. He skirted around the suddenly swarming, darkly dressed men as he ran around the royal suites. They gave him the chill more than anything else on the planet. By the time he finally found Padme's rooms, they were everywhere.

When his mind came back to the present, Padme was still looking at him, expecting a response, and Ben couldn't stop himself from grimacing as he looked away. He could still feel the cold deepening inside him, but he couldn't decide if it was telling him to run or stay hidden.

It was easier to stay hidden, to keep safe and let the danger come to him, but that wasn't what Padme needed, and it wasn't what a Jedi would do. He might just be a padawan, but he told her he was a Jedi. She needed a real Jedi right now and that's what he'd be for her sake. He couldn't save her father, but he could be a brave Jedi knight and save her.

"Nowhere is safe," he finally answered her. "But we're going to make a run for it anyway."

Daringly, he grabbed both her hands and pulled her to her feet. Then proceeded to drop them immediately and take off. After a moment, letting the cool air clear his foolish head, he glanced back to make sure she followed him, running through the shadowy side of the path. He was surprised to find she was right on his heels.

Silently, they raced through the palace gardens. Ben had to fight to stay in the lead, while not really knowing his way around. When they hit the hedge maze he slowed down and let her finally start leading him. They got further faster that way, and even if they didn't know what was around the next corner, they didn't know what was following behind them either. And with the palace to their back swarming with strange people, Ben managed to convince himself that running behind her was actually the best way to protect her.

"Ah!" she shouted, rounding the last corner. He heard her blaster go off once before he made it around himself. A row of men in black robes stood behind a rushing fountain. They each held a blaster, pointed right at the queen's head, but Padme didn't stop firing once she'd started. None of the men even moved. They didn't fight back or dodge her shots, not that she really took many good ones. Clearly, she was better with her right hook than her blaster.

Then someone shouted and Ben Kenobi nearly fainted at the sound. It was as if every bone in his bone had shattered from the cold. His eyes began to spot black and his blood should have been burning through his skin. That voice was wrong, very wrong. He knew that, but what was it saying? He couldn't understand it. His ears were ringing from the sudden sensation.

"Ben?" The queen flicked her eyes to him as she pounded her blaster against her palm. _It's jammed._

The voice called out again and this time Obi-Wan heard the word. "Fire," the voice had called the men to shoot.

The world changed. The darkness was unimportant, the people unimportant, the guns irrelevant. Obi-Wan sucked in the night air and shut his eyes. He pushed Padme behind him with one hand and held the other out to the men. He heard the triggers click, the voices murmur when nothing happened. He saw Padme's eyes widen as the men's weapons pulled away from their hands and dropped in the fountain. He saw it all, everything he was doing, but he only felt the force.

The cold was gone, but his blood still felt hot as it raced through him. It was nothing compared with the energy flowing through his limbs. _Maybe I'm not such a bad Jedi after all._

He finally let his arm fall when a rope ladder dropped down between the men and him. He glanced up and saw a Republic pilot wave at him over Qui-Gon's shoulder. Ben turned to help the queen climb up, but she was already swinging onto the first few rungs.

Ben reached for the ladder himself, averting his eyes from Padme's flowing skirt, but froze as something moved in the shadows. The chill began to creep back into his bones. He let his hand slide off the rope.

"Obi-Wan!" Qui-Gon shouted down. Ben kept his eyes on the hedges. Darkly cloaked and strange, something stepped out from the night, lighting Ben's veins on fire. "We have to leave!"

"Wait," Padme shouted out from somewhere suddenly far away. The whole world felt distant. There was nothing close, nothing real, except the stranger in the cloak. _Are you in my mind?_

"We can't leave without my father!"

 _What are you looking for in here?_

"Your father was killed one hour and twenty six minutes ago by whatever is standing down there in front of my padawan!"

 _Who are you?_

The scream that broke through Ben's trance also broke his heart. Stronger, louder, more foreign than the strangeness of the cold in his bones, was the chill that Padme's scream sent down his spine. The grief in her cry echoed through the recesses of his mind, leaving a scar on his memory that would forever remain as the pain pushed out the alien entity. _Sorry, but she was here first._

Ben took hold of the rope again and in one pull, forced himself into the air and away from the stranger. He couldn't climb into the ship fast enough. When Qui-Gon caught his arm and helped him the last few steps, it was the most relief he'd ever felt, but that quickly changed as the ship door slammed shut behind him and the pilot shifted into lightspeed, leaving Naboo far behind and the chill of the haunting figure along with it.


	3. Chapter 3

**Quick Author Note:** I consider the first three chapters to be the beginning of the story, thus I am posting all three in a row to establish the main characters, after this I plan to be updating weekly for the rest of the chapters. Enjoy!

Tatooine Desert Day:

The world rushed past Anakin Skywalker. Sand whipped at his cheeks as the wind burned his eyes. His grip on the controls tightened as his vision blurred, but the High Pass was coming up quickly –too quickly. The farm boy loosened his callused fingers, allowing the wheel to turn more naturally. His only thoughts jumped to the sharp, hard, inside wall of the pass. _To hell with pod racing and to hell with winning. I. Will. Not. Hit. Those. Damn. Rocks. Again!_

He shut his eyes and let the pods and racers around him blend into one another, blurring into obscurity as they raced around him. _Faster,_ he thought. _I just need to make the turn faster._ He yanked back on the control wheel and forced it left before even entering the pass. His speedometer began to glitch as he rounded the sharp mouth of the pass faster than the indicator could count. The rocks and sand meshed into a perfect hue of orange as the pod continued to pick up speed. Anakin let out a shout and forced the wheel back to the right to make the turn around the next bend. _Let Owen be damned. I_ will _make it through this race alive!_ He punched his fist in the air and made the next turn one handed.

When the turn ended, there was no more race. The High Pass was gone. The pods were nowhere to be found. The sky was suddenly dark, and for the first time in his eighteen years, Anakin Skywalker couldn't see sand _anywhere_.

A bright moon paled the glistening landscape of rounded rooftops and shivering trees. The leaves were rustled by a soft breeze Anakin could not feel. Suddenly, he wasn't alone. A group of figures stole through the calm scene. He stepped back seeing blasters swinging form their hips.

The world shifted. Someone called his name when he turned, no one was there. He was standing in a room covered in windows so clean; he wouldn't know the glass was there if he couldn't see his own reflection, his own _scarred_ reflection. A foreign mark ran down over his eye, and through his hauntingly dissimilar face, he could see a world of light. Buildings taller than the ridges and the High Pass or the sand dunes surrounded him. He jerked his gaze left as a sky train raced by.

As soon as his attention turned, so did his surroundings. Now he was looking at a man. Wild eyed and grim, he stared back at the farm boy with a look of strange despair. Even through a thick beard Anakin could see the frown the man wore. The world was ripping apart around them, but the man's eyes never wavered from Anakin's. The ground was more alive than a sand storm and redder than a double sunset. Blasts of fire and rivers of magma filled the boy's peripheral vision, but he couldn't bear to pull his eyes away from the man glaring back at him.

Sand in Anakin's eyes force him to blink and his life returned around him.

"Shit!" the pod racer hissed as a wall of rocks jutted up in front of him. He smacked his hand back down on the wheel and forced it toward his stomach. The tape that held it together stripped away at the flesh on his hands. Still he pulled back harder.

Just as the wheel became too slick with blood to pull back further, Anakin tried to turn. He forced the controls to the right, turning the whole pod with them. Slamming his boot heel down onto the accelerator, the farm boy gritted his teeth and tried to correct the wheel.

A slight 'click' sound managed to carry to his wind-worn ears. The wheel broke off of the control panel and landed in his lap.

"Well… this is bad," he managed to mutter, flashing his terror filled eyes back and forth from his lap to the oncoming rocks. _Rocks! That's it! I'm going to hit them either way, may as well make it work for me._

Prying his eyes away from the oncoming hurt, he grabbed the knife from inside his pocket and sliced open the safety belt across his chest. He was fast, but not fast enough. _Damn you Owen. I'm going to die and it's all your fault! You jinxed it._ The boulders were close enough to cut his nose as he leaped from the pilot seat and climbed onto the back of the pod. He had a half a second to make this work.

Anakin's stomach fell when his feet left the pod, and his heart skipped a beat as he hung for a moment in the empty air. Then his body crashed into the side of the pass. His palms slammed down against a lip of a flat stone.

"Gah!" he grunted and kicked until his feet found something to stand on. His body shook as he heard the pod crashing to the cavern floor. He didn't dare glance down to watch.

He swore again under his breath and clung tighter to the rocks, despite a sharp one stabbing him in the gut. There was still the problem of getting down from the ridge, but that was a problem for after he caught his breath.


	4. Chapter 4

Cargo Hanger Republic Ship:

Ben Kenobi stood with his back to the wall. His head hung low over his torso, while his hands clutched at his knees. He was ready to vomit again if necessary.

"Ben," someone whispered. He jerked his head up and saw Padme standing in the cargo hanger doorway. Her dark eyes had settled on his. The rims were still red from crying. She was propping her shoulder up against the hanger doorframe. Her posture suggested she was having trouble holding herself up on her own, but her eyes were swimming with concern for him instead. _Or maybe that's just what I want to see._

"Tell Qui-Gon I'll be up in a minute," he grumbled, turning his face back down as his stomach twisted again. He gritted his teeth and drove his finger nails through the folds of his robe, trying not to wretch again. _At least wait till she's gone and I'm alone._

"He said not to bother you. I just came to make sure you're alright," she said, shrugging away from the wall. "But you're not."

"Neither are you." He wiped his mouth against the sleeve of his robe and tried to stand. Something in him seemed to settle, so he tried to take a step toward her. His legs wobbled and his knees buckled. He stumbled toward her, feeling his center of balance spinning around in the air above his head.

Padme's hands clasped around his shoulders and steadied him.

"But you're _really_ not."

"Thank you," he murmured. She let her hands fall away as he looked up at her. He swayed a little, but she didn't return her hold. After a moment, even her gaze fell away.

"What happened back there? When I saw you, it was like you were being held by something we couldn't see." The Jedi's stomach tightened, but his eyes stayed on her face until she finally looked back up.

"It... it wasn't that I couldn't move, it was more like there was nowhere to move _to_. There was just nothing around me anymore, just this feeling," Ben paused and realized this was something he should have shared with Qui-Gon, or waited to explain to the Jedi council, or at least his friends in the academy. Padme didn't even truly know him. He hadn't been able to tell her about her father. Why was he so compelled to explain _this_ to her now?

"Ben?" She whispered, leaning in slightly. The subtle down turn of her lip was weighted with more concern than he'd ever earned from her.

 _That_ , he decided. That was why he talked to her, and why he would _continue_ talking to her.

She was concerned about _him_ , not the fate of the universe, his training, or what this meant for everyone around them. Yes, she was a queen now, with people to worry about, but he was also a padawan Jedi with people and concerns of his own. _For right now, here, Padre Amidala is concerned about Ben Kenobi, and I trust sharing this with her, as simple as that._

"It felt like he had his hand wrapped around my mind, like he was sifting through my thoughts," he eventually continued.

"What like a Jedi mind trick?"

"No, that's like persuasively asking someone a question, this..." he stopped to swallow the burn of bile threatening to encase his throat. "This was invasive, _wrong_."

"Ben, I," Padme began, but the ground beneath them shifted.

Gravity turned sideways as the whole ship tilted abruptly. Something louder than engine began to buzz through the air around them. The distance between them shortened quickly as the queen lost her footing and fell into his chest. Ben pulled his arms around her shoulders to stop her fall.

"What's happening?" she said, pushing away as she found her footing.

"I don't kno—" he started, but never finished. The ship convulsed around them. A blinding light flared through the rear wall as a new wave of movement knocked Ben off his feet.

When he opened his eyes, Padme was lying beside him. Louder than the hum of the engine, buzzing pulsed in his ears. The world seemed slow around them. Fire and water mixed in the aftermath of whatever had blown open a few walls of the ship.

He slapped his palms down on the metal floor and began crawling toward the queen. Her eyes were closed and most of her hair had fallen in her face. Parts of her nightgown were torn and some of the revealed flesh was cut and bleeding.

When he reached out for her, he saw his own arm for the first time, scratched and streaked with blood, his skin was sensitive where the rest of his sleeve should have been. It was strange, even as he reached out to wake the queen, he was uncomfortably aware that his clothes had changed. He couldn't remember the last time he had been without his robe. It was probably before he joined the Jedi.

Ben's hand found Padme's just as the ship began to turn again. This time there was no tilting and changing. The queen's eyes flicked open as Ben started to move her hand. The ship was slanting in one direction, while moving in another. The whole hanger seemed to be spinning rapidly around them.

"Ah!" Padme let a small shout slip as she stared into Ben's eyes. _Nine_ , it was the ninth time they'd done that, and the only reason he was counting again was that it very well might have been the _last_ time.

Her fingers curled around his, holding tighter the more the hanger began to feel like the universe was falling out from beneath them. He kept his eyes on hers and allowed his fingers to do the same.

A brighter explosion shook the already turning ship and Padme's nails began to bite into his skin. Part of the hanger began to fall apart. Pieces of metal and wood flew everywhere as cargo crates began to smash against the walls.

There was nothing he could do to stop the ship from turning. He wasn't trained enough to stop a ship mid fall, let alone from the inside, but he felt _something_. Something in the back of his mind was begging him to open his thoughts to the force.

Obi-Wan released the queen's hand and rolled onto his back. He set his hands above them and stretched out his wounded arms as far as they could go. Energy flowed through him, pulsing from his thoughts to his arms, moving in waves. The force filled him, until he could feel the pain in his arms no longer. His hands moved higher as he widened the shield he was trying to create, encasing them in an umbrella, protecting them from the rain of shrapnel showering down at them.

He felt Padme's arms curl around his waist for support, but it was an afterthought. The queen was far away, just a part of the larger scene he was trying to manipulate.

Her hold tightened as one of the structural beams fell from the ceiling above them. Obi-Wan gritted his teeth and tried to force the beam away, but it was no use. There was too much. It was all too much to protect them from.

The Jedi growled low as he pulled one of his hands away. He focused all his power on what he had to do. The beam began to shake as the padawan channeled all the force to flow through the hand that held it away from them. With his other hand, he pried away the clinging queen. Then, at the last moment, Ben Kenobi changed his focus. He moved the force from his outstretched hand to the other and force-pushed the queen from his side, allowing the beam to come crashing down at him. Then the exhaustion overcame him, and the world went black.


	5. Chapter 5

**Author note:** One of the main things I felt had potential that was never fully realized in the the prequels was the idea of Owen and his relationship with Anakin. So, here goes.

Thank you to the people who are commenting! If you haven't please do. I welcome comments, criticisms, predictions, anything. Enjoy!

Tatooine High Pass Evening:

The setting suns painted the canyon a deep shade of red. Anakin tried to hide the way it made him shiver, but as he clawed away at the sand around the pod, he could feel eyes following him. In reality, there was nothing behind him, but the eyes of judgment worn by the man on the burning planet haunted his thoughts and worried him more than the wreckage under his hands.

Sweat beaded down on Anakin's –well _everything,_ actually. The suns were sweltering; the air was dryer than normal, and the sand was hot underfoot, even through his work boots. His fingers finally dug their way under the side of the pod. The sharp metal edge dug into his scratched up hands.

"Ahrg!" he growled, lifting again despite the burn in his muscles and the sunburn coming on the back of his neck. "Owen, lift your damn half."

His brother's round and red face appeared over the side of the other half of the pod. As usual, he was frowning.

"I am lifting!"

"Then lift more!"

Owen's hands appeared near his face as Anakin's suddenly felt the full weight of the load. _Oh no._ The pod plunked back into the sand and pulled him down with it. His mother's voice rang in the back of his mind as he picked his head up. _What did we learn today Anakin?_ He grimaced and shook the sand off his face.

 _Faster is_ not _the answer, and Owen is stronger than he looks,_ he thought bitterly.

"You're the worst pod racer ever," Owen complained for what must have been the hundredth time.

"Keep your voice down," Anakin warned, pushing himself out of the sand.

"When you said that back on the farm it made sense, but out here, who is going to hear me?"

" _I_ will." He began to move toward the ship again, looking it over for a better place to grab hold.

"Yeah," Owen grumbled, shoving his arms together over his chest. "Well, better to hear it from me than someone else. Anakin, you're a terrible pilot."

Anakin stopped dead in his tracks, feeling his heart begin to race and his blood ran hot, he could actually feel the anger burning in the tips of his ears. He turned to glare at his brother.

"I was doing fine until the wheel popped off," he argued. " _You're_ a terrible engineer."

"You were going too fast."

"I was not."

"I'm a good engineer, Anakin. I know what breaks my pod."

"It's _my_ pod!"

"No, it's mine. I made it and you broke it pulling back to hard because you were trying to get around the pass too fast again."

"It's a _race_ ," he reminded his brother. Owen shook his head.

"And it could've been your last."

"Owen, you weren't even there!"

The space between them quieted and Anakin looked back at the crashed pod. There wasn't much left that wasn't covered by sand, despite his best efforts. It had taken them far too long to come back for it.

This time, he could feel real eyes on him – _Owen's eyes_ , watching him as he dropped back onto his knees. The farm boy leaned in and began to brush some of the sand away from the side, revealing the name that had been scratched into the side of the engine -a stupid made up word: Vader. He sat back and listened to the silence of the hot evening drowning out the loss of the day. Owen was good at getting quiet whenever he saw Anakin was about to get too riled up. It was smart. The quiet always helped him calm down.

"Maybe we can scrap it for parts," he sighed. "Dad would love that."

"When did we start caring about what Dad wants?" Owen scoffed, bending down beside his brother.

"We could use the money."

Owen's hand clasped down on Anakin's shoulder and squeezed.

"No way in hell, An. If we are scraping my baby, we're using the money to build a new one."

"Fine." He glanced back up at his brother, unable to hide the smirk growing on his lips. "But this time _I_ get to pick the name."

"Hey! I thought that was pretty cool. It sounds menacing." Anakin rolled his eyes and shook off the familiar hand.

"That's why you're not the cool one," he reminded Owen.

"Then why do I have a girl and you don't?" Owen laughed as Anakin pushed himself out of the sand and crossed his arms.

"You know Owen, not everybody likes girls." His brother jumped to his feet and punched him in the shoulder.

"Course not, but _you_ do," he said.

"Yeah , whatever." Anakin rubbed his arm. Owen really _was_ stronger than he looked. "Besides I'm not convinced Beru even counts."

"Why wouldn't she?" Owen's face fell into a strange expression, somewhere between concern and defiance. He crossed his arms again.

"She's been around us too much. She's practically our sister. Who'd want to kiss their sister?"

"You're just jealous she picked me instead of you."

"Are you kidding?!"Anakin laughed, though it hurt a little.

It was only half true what Owen said, but the wound was still a little too fresh to joke about. Beru had been there forever, especially since their mom died. So it was easy enough to fall for her, but even though he _was_ jealous of Owen, Anakin couldn't help wondering that maybe falling in love wasn't supposed to be so easy, so simple.

"Owen, she still calls me Ani," he reminded him. "If anything, I'm jealous of the time you spend with her and instead of helping me with the pod. Maybe if you didn't, the wheel wouldn't have come off mid race."

Despite the joke, Anakin looked up to share an uncommonly somber stare with his brother. Beru wasn't the only thing they both loved. The pod had been something they'd started as kids, pieced together from the scraps they'd found at other race crashes. He could see in Owen's eyes that the irony wasn't lost on him.

A resounding bang startled their sad eyes. Anakin wheeled back to watch as a ship dove into the atmosphere. _No one ever comes here in a ship that big..._

"It's on fire!" Owen gasped. Anakin's gaze plummeted back to the ground along with a piece of the ships underbelly.

"It's going to crash," he whispered. Something seemed to move through him, something calm and cool that he couldn't explain. He'd had the feeling before, but never like this. Something was pulling him toward the ship before it even touched the planet's surface.

"We should go get help," Owen suggested.

"We should go _be_ help."


	6. Chapter 6

**Sorry this took so long! Please leave a comment! I like to hear feedback good and bad!**

Tatooine Desert Twilight:

 _Sore. Everything was sore_. Padme didn't have much else to think about as she finally began to wake. The queen didn't even try to open her eyes and assess the damage. She was happy with the illusion of darkness her eyelids had created. Blind, she was able to construct her surrounds for herself. _It was all a dream_ , she lied. _You're home, in your bed. Father's down the hall, the guards are at the door, and nothing is ever going to harm you._

In every bone of her body she could feel the real pain that made that dream so necessary. She needed to pretend it wasn't there, that every inch of her didn't feel like the skin had been scraped off.

Her wistful longing couldn't drive away the flames sizzling around her. No dream could help her move her numb limbs, but it did comfort her enough to blanket the fear that burned up inside her. The grief and pain forced its way into her eyes and began rolling down her cheek in a stream of uncontrolled tears.

"Hey!" someone screamed. "Hey!"

Thundering footsteps surrounded Padme as she startled awake. A pair of boot toes shuffled the sand beside her nose. Someone leaned down, blocking the light of a setting sun. His face was shadowed and the side of his body was tinted red by the twilight.

"Are you okay?" asked a tenor and shaking voice. Padme peeled apart her lips. They were dry and cracking.

She croaked out a sound, but it wasn't a word.

"Here, hang on," the voice cautioned. The next moment, water was running over her lips. She sputtered and tried to sit up. A hand pushed against her back to help her.

"You seem alright, does anything feel broken?" An arm pulled the canteen away from her lips as a boy leaned down and glanced over her. He had dirty blond hair brushing over his forehead, and his pale blue eyes looked at her like she'd just fallen off a swing, instead of crash-landed in a Republic transport vessel.

She shook her head.

"Do you want to try to move?" he asked. She nodded and felt his hand disappear from her back. Her nails dug into the sand as she started to force herself up.

"Gah!" she bit her lip and grabbed her ankle.

The boy leaned in suddenly. She tried to twist away, but was too slow. The stranger scooped her up in his arms and lifted her into the air. Padme let out a surprised shout.

"Hey, it's alright," he said. "I'm not going to hurt you, but you're ankle doesn't look so good." She glanced down at her foot. Whoever he was, he was right. It was purple and green, and also a little bit red. _Is that the sunset or am I bleeding?_

Then she let her eyes dart around the crash site. She couldn't see anyone else, neither the Jedi nor the pilot. There were pieces of metal everywhere, and most of them were on fire.

Beyond the boy's shoulder, she could see the body of the ship. It looked more like a mangled carcass now. It was down to the bones of the structure, nothing else had made it to the ground intact. _I was in a ship-crash. I_ should _be bleeding!_ She glanced at the destroyed ship again _. I should be dead…_

"Anakin!" another voice shouted. This one sounded deeper and was shaking less.

"Owen?" the boy shouted into Padme's ear. She pulled back.

"I need some help!"

The boy began to carry her in the direction of the voice. Another boy came into view around the corner of the dead ship. He was looking down at a body trapped under the rubble.

"No!" Padme breathed as the face became clearer. She pushed at her holder's neck and rolled out of his arms, dropping back into the sand. She scrambled to her feet and began to run toward body.

"Ben!" she called. "Ben!"

Ben's legs and torso were pressed into the sand under the weight of a piece of the wreckage.

Pain shot through Padme's foot like a blaster hit.

"Ah!" she gasped as her knee ankle gave out under her. She fell partially back into the sand.

"Hey, slow down," cautioned the boy behind her. "I think your ankles broken." His arm scooped around her shoulder and held her up. He helped her over to his friend and Ben's body.

"Ben, can you hear me?" she fell down beside the padawan and stared down at his closed eyes. Sand peppered the bloody scratches on his cheeks and forehead. His eyes stayed shut, but he moved his head a little.

"It's going to be okay," she assured him, brushing the hair from his scratched face. "I'm going to get you out of this."

"Anakin," one of the boys whispered again. "You have to do something. He's not going to make it under there."

"I can't just turn it on and off," the tenor voice hissed.

Padme glanced back at them, exchanging a strange look.

"You have to help me lift this," she pleaded. "He saved my life." She looked back down at Ben's pained features. _It must have seemed very gallant to you_ , she wanted to scold him, _using the force to save me instead of yourself, Jedi Knight indeed._

"Stand back, Amidala," boomed a familiar voice. Padme lifted her eyes and watched Qui-Gon Jinn striding out of the smoke and flames. She shuffled back in the sand. Anakin's hand grabbed her arm and helped to pull her to her feet.

The old Jedi stretched out his hand and began to close his eyes. Something strange and calm overcame the man's aging features. The evening wind pushed back his long, dark hair, but he seemed untouched by the wreckage flaming around him. His steady fingers shifted and so did the metal on top of Ben.

"Ah!" Ben's eyes flared open. His head shot up and let out a terrifying scream.

"You're hurting him!" the bigger boy shouted. _Owen – the Anakin-one had referred to the big-one as, Owen._

"He has to concentrate!" she growled, turning to glare at the Owen-one. He had the same hair as Anakin, but his darker eyes were filled with less naïve concern. Strangely, he decided to turn that gaze on his Anakin friend instead of her.

"I can't," Anakin whispered.

Ben's second scream stole Padme's attention, but she did hear Owen whisper back.

"You have to try!"

Padme watched as the hunk of ship began to lift off of Ben's body. Blood was pouring from a gash on his knee and another on his hip. His shoulder looked twisted the wrong way, and his chest was heaving. _At least that means he's breathing._

Another explosion sent her senses reeling. Her ears rang and her eyes blurred. The back of the ships skeleton had burst into flames. Padme tumbled sideways, but Anakin's arm caught hers and pulled her back. The force of the blast sent Qui-Gon to his knees. The piece of ship began to fall back over Ben.

"No!" Padme cried.

It froze. The hunk of wreckage hung low in the air, shivering, but never touched Ben.

 _How is he doing that?_ She wondered naively, looking at Qui-Gon, but he wasn't moving. The Jedi master was lying face down in the sand.

The hand holding her arm faltered. Slowly, the queen dared look out the corner of her eye.

Anakin had his other arm extended. The hand was shaking, as if holding some incredibly heavy thing, but his flexed fingers were completely barren.

"Ahrg!" he finally grunted and the piece of ship flung away. It didn't go far, but the metal fell enough to the left, that Ben was safe.

The queen stared at the stranger beside her until he put his hand down. He released her arm when his eyes found hers. She held his gaze for a moment before racing back to Ben's side.

"Hey," she whispered, placing her palm against the Jedi's cheek.

"Qui-Gon," Ben groaned tilting his head up.

"He's alright, just unconscious," Owen called. "At least I hope so…"

"It's you I'm worried about," she admitted, looking over Ben's bloody state. The wound on his side was the worst. Blood was pooling through the fabric of his robe.

"Thanks for that," Ben croaked. She let her hand fall from his cheek and stuck them over the blood then pressed down, trying to slow the bleeding.

"Here," Anakin sat down beside her and pushed his hands onto the wound instead. She watched him. He leaned in to apply pressure to the wound. His head moved close to hers.

"You're a Jedi," she hissed low into his ear. He sat back.

"No," he said. "I'm Anakin, nice to meet you."

Ben groaned. Padme looked down. His eyes began to roll up in his head.

"Ben," she reached down and grabbed hand. "Ben!" _You're not allowed to die on me too._ She squeezed his hand. _You're supposed to be protecting me._

"We need something to stop the bleeding," Anakin suggested. She looked down at the tattered shreds that used to be the skirt of her nightgown and began to tear off a piece.

"I won't say anything if you help me save him," she told him.

"What do you think I've been doing?" Anakin began to remove his shirt.

"Whoa!" Padme protested, averting her eyes from his bare chest.

"Look, _you_ don't have much to work with," he told her, glancing over her ruined dress before continuing to pull the shirt over his head and press the cloth against Ben's side. Almost immediately, the blood began to soak through from Ben's robes to Anakin's shirt.

"We have to get them some help," she pleaded, adding her hands to Anakin's. She pressed the cloth harder against Ben's hip.

"Padme," he groaned. His eyes began to glaze over.

"We don't live far," Anakin explained. "I can carry him."

"What about Qui-Gon?"

"Uh, well," the boy stammered looking over his shoulder at the other one. He was bent down, trying to get a hold on the Jedi master's shoulders. "Owen's stronger than he looks."


	7. Chapter 7

Tatooine Moisture Farm Night:

"They can't stay here," their father argued as Anakin turned away let his head rest on the nearest wall.

"They're in no condition to move again," Owen spat back. They'd been going on like that for a while. "At least wait to make a decision until the older man wakes up."

"You've seen their robes, boy. You know what kind of people they are."

"Yeah, they're injured people who need our help!"

Anakin shook his head without bothering to lift it. The rough plaster scratched his forehead.

"Psst! Ani," someone hissed. Anakin rolled his head to the left. Beru was standing in the doorway, coaxing him closer. Her dark blond hair was highlighted by the moonlight she was blocking, but her blue eyes looked at him the same way they always had. "I need some help."

"Wha-" he began, but she'd already grabbed his arm.

She dragged him out the door and into the night. Anakin stumbled through the dark courtyard toward one of the other domes, but Beru never faltered. She knew the place like the back of her hand. It was almost concerning, considering she _wasn't_ the one of them who'd been born and raised there.

"Do you remember when you broke your collar bone?"

"Yeah, it kind of hurt a little, Ru," he muttered. "People tend to remember that sort of thing."

"Your hip was gashed open too, through to the muscle," she continued, ignoring his sarcasm.

"Yeah, you helped you're father stitch it back up."

"Good, that's what your job is," she said, releasing his hand as he entered the room. It was one of the rooms kept aside for the harvest time extra hands they hired every year. Sometimes Beru just stayed in it too.

She turned and threw a towel at his face and kept walking.

"Um, I -" he began to protest. "I don't know how." He pulled the towel from his face and tried to clean his hands off with it. When his eye adjusted to the room, he saw the young Jedi was lying flat on the bed with the girl sitting beside him. Her big, dark eyes fluttered as she turned to look at Anakin.

She was still wearing the rags from before, but her ankle had a bandage around it. Her hands were delicately clasped on the young man's.

Anakin smiled shortly and turned back to Beru. She was threading a needle.

"Really, Ani, you've been stitched up enough yourself to grasp the concept," she sighed. "Besides I'm going to need you to help me hold him steady"

"Ru, I'm not comfortable with this."

"I'll do it," the girl chimed in, turning around to face them.

"Look honey, I'm sure you want to help," Beru began. Her strange tone demeaned the girl almost instantly.

Anakin took a short step back, _just in case,_ as the girl stood up. _They wouldn't fight here would they?_ He couldn't speak for the nightgown girl of course _, but Ru might_.

"It sounds like I have a hell of a lot more training then either of you, and I'm not as scared as he is."

"I'm not scared," Anakin protested.

"Oh yes you are,"Beru whispered "What kind of training do you have?"

"I've stitched someone together before."

"Good enough for me, you're hired," Beru snatched the towel back from Anakin's hand and gave it to the girl. "Ani, I still need your help keeping him still. Go hold his shoulders."

Anakin nodded, watching the hardness in Beru's gaze grow until her eyebrows furrowed into a line. Her father's eyebrows did the same thing when he operated.

The young man didn't really move. Anakin wasn't certain why he needed to 'hold him down'. Sure, a normal person would be screaming, or crying, or trying to stop the two, dead quiet, girls from driving metal and string through his knee, but not the one Anakin Skywalker was supposed to be holding. No – _this one_ _man_ was still as a corpse, which made the farm boy that much more nervous.

"He's meditating," the girl said after a while. Unlike Beru, the girl's face had fallen into a strange blankness. Her focus wasn't so forced. She was calm, stitching up the Jedi like sewing a blanket.

"Oh." Anakin tried to refrain from pointing out that the man looked so peaceful he seemed lifeless. "Where did you learn to stitch people up?"

"I went to a medical training camp with a tutor of mine," she answered casually. "And it was really only the _one_ person before this."

"How'd that happen?"

"Ani, some of us are trying to concentrate," Beru hushed.

He shut his mouth and looked back down at the blank face of the Jedi. A sudden shiver shocked Anakin's system. The blood in his veins seemed to boil into ice and burn him with cold. His mouth dropped open and he let out a sudden gasp. He forced his hands away and stepped back.

"Something's wrong," he warned the girls, pushing back into wall to get as far from the feeling as possible.

Beru's eyes shot up first, meeting his concerned gaze, knowingly.

"What?" the other girl whispered. Anakin searched his mind for a way to explain, but the Jedi twitched and Anakin grabbed him sending another wave of painful chill out into his hand and up his arms.

"Ani hold him!" Beru growled and shot her gaze back down to the patient.

"I'm trying, Ru!" he argued, just as the man under his fingers began to convulse. Anakin could feel the skin of the man flaking under his nails as he fought to control the shaking. It was nearly impossible to steady the shoulders while fighting against the waves of rushing cold and pain. _Fear._ The feeling seemed like fear flowing inside him, but it was different from _being_ _afraid._ This fear was uncontrollable.

"Anakin!" Beru demanded again as the other girl flung her torso onto the legs of the man to force him to steady. The terrified farm boy gripped the shaking shoulders harder and forced his weight down. He could see the whites of the man's half open eyes as a spark of rapid heat rushed through his body. The fire encased Anakin's mind and then shot out through his arms and fingers, pushing the cold fear back into its rightful owner.

As he felt the spark slither through his veins, a real explosion burst from the lamp overhead. A shower of yellow sparks rained down onto Beru and the girl. The man under Anakin's hold stopped shaking. His eyes shut and his breath steadied as he sunk back into a deathly calm.

"Anakin?" Beru's eyes peered at him through the moonlight.

"I don't know." And he didn't. He had no idea how to explain what had happened. It was like a reflex. He hadn't had an outburst of power in years, and even _that_ wasn't how to explain what he'd just done. The realization that this man was pushing his fear into him had made him panic. He'd forced it out like forcing out the knife that stabbed you, quick and reflexive. It had just been instinct.

"Anakin." A grunt came from the doorway. His father was standing in the night, hardly visible as he shrugged against the doorframe, arms crossed. The farm boy didn't have to see the old man to know that his mouth had drawn into a deep and disappointed line.

"Gaven," Beru said. "I still need him."

"It's okay Ru," Anakin sighed. "This guys' not gonna move."

"Ani, he just did," she started to protest and even the other girl lifted her eyes from her friend when he started to leave. The way the moonlight made her eyes glisten as they lingered on him, made him wish he wasn't walking away.

Her eyes followed him back out of the dome. Anakin couldn't blame her. If his fate was being decided within eyesight, he'd be watching too.

He stepped out into the night and for a moment, when he looked into his father's face; he wished he _were_ the one watching from within.

"Anikin, go back inside the house." His father crossed his arms over his chest and glared into Anakin's eyes with a force all his own.

"I just wanted to help."

"Beru," his father continued, moving his gaze off Anakin and over his shoulder. "You need assistance, you ask for Owen."

"Yes sir," she muttered in her typical fashion.

Anakin sometimes wondered what it would take to get Beru to want to disobey the farm owner. She'd always been afraid to be sent away, sent home. Her home was nothing to run away from, but he once caught her admitting the farm was more a home to her than anywhere in the galaxy.

"Anakin, go find your brother for her."

Anakin didn't move. He watched his father shift slightly in his boots.

"Are they going to stay?" he pressed.

"Until morning," his father muttered then leaned in, lowering his voice. "I want you to stay away from these people. Do you understand?"

"No. They need our help," he muttered, glancing away to turn back to the girl in the nightgown. She wasn't watching them anymore. She was sewing the Jedi's skin shut again. What could he tell his father to make him see?

 _I already have to trust her_ , he thought. _I don't have a choice. She already knows everything, and she promised to keep our secret._ He looked back at his father, then down at the space between their boots. He knew he could never tell his father those things.

"Ani, please," his father sighed, placing his hand on Anakin's cheek.

Anakin glance up. It had been a long time since he and his father had even stood within reach of each other. He locked his gaze on the gray blue eyes they shared. It was the only part of him that looked like his father. Owen looked like him. Anakin looked like his mother, or so everyone said.

"I'll go get Owen," he grumbled, pushing his father's hand away. He stalked back out into the night and stumbled his way through the dark, back to the home dome.


	8. Chapter 8

Tattooing Moisture Farm Morning:

Padme spent the night at Ben Kenobi's side, waiting for him to start convulsing again. She'd sewn up what small part of the Jedi Knight she could, but he was clearly more damaged on the inside. There was nothing she could do to help that. All that was left to her was waiting, and waiting was worse than stitching a man's flesh back together.

For the first time in what felt like a lifetime, she had time to think, to worry, and even to grieve. She tried not to. She tried to force her mind to be as blank as Ben's face, but there was no quieting the storm that thundered within her against the silence of the morning farm.

The dawn was peeking in through the window and doorway. It was already hot, but the queen hardly felt it. She was too cold inside, cold with dread and longing.

Her father's smiling face haunted her when her eyes shut and Ben's unwavering sleep occupied them when open. There was no way to escape the worry or fear. She'd lost so much in only a few hours, her father, her home, her planet. As she let the thoughts and misery sink in, the tears began to burn her cheeks. She glanced at Ben and began to wipe them away. She'd gained something today. A queenship, and maybe a friend... so long as she didn't lose him _too_.

"Here," the voice of a shadow stalking out of the sun announced, carrying the sound of boot heels up the steps along with it. The girl, Beru, crossed the threshold and extended a pile of clothes in her thick arms. "These are for you."

Her shoulder length blond hair shook slightly as she dropped her hands when Padme reached for the pile. She had a soft face and offered the displaced queen a comforting smile along with the clothes, but her eyes were sharp. They darted around and stuck on Padme in a way that made her want to shrug out of her own skin and into Ben's. The girl avoided looking at her patient altogether.

"Thank you," she offered. "You're a very kind host."

"I'm not the host. This is Gaven's farm. I just didn't think Anakin and Owen had anything to fit you," the girl answered flatly. Her smile thinned out into a line.

"I should still thank you for helping him," she nodded at Ben. The girl seemed to twitch slightly when acknowledging the Jedi.

"You sound like a politician," the girl smirked. "How's your ankle?"

"Fine," Padme lied. She hadn't stood up since before Anakin had left.

"Well, we're going to test that. Stand up," Beru muttered, moving closer. Padme pushed herself out of the chair and let the bandaged foot fall to the floor. She pursed her lips as the pain settled in, but it wasn't anything she couldn't handle.

"I need your chair. I'm going to fix the light," Beru continued to explain. Padme backed away.

"These lights blow out all the time. Gaven is too cheap to rethink the design," the girl grumbled as Padme watched her play with the wiring in the scorched ceiling.

"That must be problematic," she agreed.

Beru glanced down and caught the queen's gaze. She could see in her searching blue eyes that the farm girl knew the explosion was more than just a wiring problem, and she wanted to know what Padme knew too. The queen dropped her gaze. She had so many questions, and this girl clearly already knew Anakin's secret. Still, Padme knew that even talking to Beru was breaking her promise.

"Amidala," a husky voice asked as Beru climbed down from the chair. Qui-Gon's form darkened the doorway.

"Qui-Gon!" Padme stepped past the farm girl's broad shoulders and met the Jedi at the door. "How are you feeling?"

"Better than Obi-Wan I assume," the man sighed. His eyes stuck on Ben for a brief moment. Padme felt her stomach turn. The worry in his gaze was more emotion than she'd expected from him. Then his eyes dropped away from Ben and he turned back to the sunshine. His face was unfazed.

"Walk with me," he said and nodded toward the courtyard. The queen glanced reluctantly back at their comatose friend. Beru shot her a small, meek smile.

"I'll watch him," she assured. Padme nodded and followed the Jedi Knight into the desert sun.

"How are you?" Qui-Gon asked as they trotted down the cement steps.

"Alive, thanks to your padawan. He saved my life," she began.

"You're safety was his primary assignment. I am glad he was able to save you where I could not help your father."

"Yes." Padme let her eyes drop down to watch the sand under her feet. It was getting hot and the burning of her bare heels was almost enough to distract her from the pain in her heart, _almost_. "You were with him last night?"

"All too late I'm afraid," he sighed. Padme shook her head and refrained from asking questions she knew she didn't want the answers to. _Did her father suffer? How did he die? Who killed him? What was she supposed to do about it?_

"The soldiers in black, they had blasters," she said instead. Qui-Gon's hand slid over the hilt of his lightsaber.

"They were Imperialists."

"Yes, they were," he said, letting his hand fall from the hilt of the weapon.

There was a pause.

"I want to go to Alderaan," she said suddenly. Qui-Gon looked down at her, blocking one of the morning suns with his head of long dark hair. "I have friends there. The royal family is personal friends."

"You need to go to Coruscant, where the full force of the Republic can protect you."

"How are we getting out of here? The ship was destroyed," she reminded him.

"I'll find us transport."

"We don't even know what planet we landed on," she hissed. "So far the locals don't seem very fond of Jedi." He shook his head.

"We haven't met all the locals," he said. "There are good people throughout the galaxy, my queen. We will find some here."

Padme looked around the small courtyard.

" _These_ are good people," she said, thinking of the farm boy and his secrets. "As good as they can be."

"Yes, and instead of overstaying our welcome, I am going to go ask Gaven if he knows where we can find a pilot. You stay here with Obi-wan."

Padme nodded and watched him go. He limped a little as he went, but did a decent job hiding it until he reached to steps that lead to the desert above. If she hadn't seen him in the wreckage, she'd never guess he'd been hurt.

The queen turned around and walked back into the only place she knew, the little round white room with a domed roof and a young Jedi laying on a table.

Beru met her in the doorway and the girls looked at each other as they passed, but said nothing.

"Ru!" someone called.

"Yeah Owen?!" the girl shouted back.

"I need some help!"

Beru looked back at Padme.

"You'll be fine, he's just resting," she explained. Then she turned back to the door. "Coming!"

The girl disappeared into the sun. Padme looked around the room, alone again with her blank-faced friend.

She walked to Ben's side and picked up the clothes Beru had left on the chair. She bent down to Ben's ear and whispered.

"Don't peak." Then she slipped into the corner and changed into the farm girl's clothes, a plain brown dress, and blue coat.

She sat back down at Ben's side and slipped her hand into his again.

"Please, Ben, wake up," she whispered and smiled sadly, feeling her eyes water and burn. "It's my birthday."

"It's your birthday?" someone asked and Padme jumped out of the chair.

Anakin Skywalker stood in the doorway. He was pushing his hand through his dark blond hair and smiling sheepishly.

"Sorry," he mumbled. "I… uh, I needed something." He leaned in and grabbed the handle on the wall. It lifted open revealing a group of tools. She knew the names of some, but not others. Whatever he picked was as foreign to her as everything else on the planet, including the boy in front of her.

He straightened and looked back at her, the tool twisting in his hand. Their eyes met and he shrugged once before backing out the door.

Padme turned back to Ben.

"Smooth Anakin," she heard him say and smiled.

The pounding of feet on the steps pushed her lips back down and she turned but found herself smirking again when it was Anakin still darkening the doorway.

"After everything you've been through," he started and came back into the room. He reached out and offered her his hand. "You shouldn't be stuck here on your birthday."

She looked at Ben, then back at Anakin. Sunlight played in his hair and the day seemed to come inside with him. His lips curled into a smile so simple she could hardly believe it was real. Honest kindness beamed from every corner of his face, no trace of the heavy secret that hid behind.

Padme took Anakin's hand.


End file.
